I have been watching those Zatoichi black and white shows. I do not have high speed internet so have to order the dvd’s from Netflix.
Although the idea that a blind person could have such incredible senses is pretty ridiculous, they are very entertaining.
Something interesting to me is the girls. About half of them truly are beautiful but about half are really plain or even ugly. The Japanese must have a different idea of beauty.
They do manage to have just about the right mixture of comedy, not too much but enough.
I first stumbled across the Zatoichi films back when IFC used to do “Samurai Saturdays.” I was hooked in short order.
Although the first few were in black and white, the remaining series got the most from color and incredibly beautiful composition and framing. Every frame seemed like a still photo.
The anti-hero character of Zatoichi was the epitome of “walk softly but carry a big stick”, and was a perfect folk-hero for a nation still licking its wounds from its stunning defeat twenty years earlier.
Beautiful films that have held up very nicely, even with the passage of time.